Publications

Gwerddon, 26(2) The Foundation Phase (FP) is a statutory curriculum in each state school in Wales since 2008. The curriculum follows a developmentally appropriate pedagogy, and encourages children to engage by learning through experiences. The paper that follows is taken from a wider evaluation of the FP, commissioned by Welsh Government in 2012 and considers…

The Labour Force Survey is used to examine the influence of sector on the UK gender pay gap 1997–2015. The assessment is twofold: first comparing gender pay gaps within sectors and second through identifying the contribution of the concentration of women in the public sector to the overall gender pay gap. The long-term narrowing of…

This article reports on a study of how young people in a post-industrial UK town reflect on their sense of health, place and identity. Drawing on 56 qualitative interviews with 14–15 year olds, we explore how young people negotiate public space and how public lighting and darkness affect interactions with their surroundings. The young people…

Background We propose that arts based methodologies can be of value in the production and exchange of evidence in supporting public health related policy. This article reports on a collaborative piece of work resulting from two projects which took place in a former coal mining town in South Wales. Methods We used a participatory framework…

The article draws upon Bourdieu’s concepts of habitus and cultural capital to provide an in-depth analysis of the gender differences in students’ motivation for undertaking postgraduate (PG) education in Mainland China. It reports an in-depth case study comprising 381 questionnaires and 30 semi-structured interviews. The quantitative data show that students who enter PG education do…

In this article we discuss findings from our ethnography investigating how volunteering in local associational life is changing, asking whether structural factors fixed in localities remain important or whether, as others have suggested, volunteering is becoming disembedded from place. Across two locations, we observe how situational variables, including belonging, identification and interaction, remain important determinants…

This paper focuses on the ‘mainstreaming’ of charities into schools. There have been growing concerns about the permeation of business and business values in education, but relatively little attention has been paid to the ways in which schools are increasingly engaged in the ‘business’ of fundraising for charities. Drawing on survey data from the WISERDEducation…

Since the Research Excellence Framework of 2014 (REF2014) ‘impact’ has created a conceptual conundrum gradually being pieced together by academics across the Higher Education sector. Emerging narratives and counter-narratives focus upon its role in dictating institutional reputation and funding to universities. However, not only does literature exploring impact, rather than ‘REF2014 impact’ per se, seldom…

This paper presents data that consider ways in which young people experience the curriculum through the lens of subject examination syllabuses (for GCSEs), their associated assessment techniques and structures, and educational policies at national and school level concerning subject choice. Drawing upon an original qualitative dataset from a mixed-methods study of students’ views and experiences…

The number of studies using biographical narrative data has increased worldwide. Given the variety of analytical approaches in narrative research, a critical investigation of the relationship between the methodological procedures and the implications for research practice is needed. This article reports on a mixed analysis study applying three analytical methods to autobiographical narrative interview data:…